Hi everyone, I am literally brand new and I'm looking for a really simple step by step recipe to try and brew my first APA or IPA. I have a 16.2l pot to start with and all the fermentation bins. Like I said I'm brand new so looking to follow something which is easy. I've tried looking online and I haven't found much for complete beginners. Metric would be even better! Thanks so much!
Hoppy recipe
- Thread starter bruski23
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BrewnWKopperKat
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I'll offer Cincinnati Pale Ale in How to Brew, 4e.
Or look in the APA and IPA sections of our recipe archive/database.
Those are tested recipes with feedback and comments.
IPAs: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/forums/homebrew-ale-recipes.62/?prefix_id=56
APAs: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/forums/homebrew-ale-recipes.62/?prefix_id=70
Those are tested recipes with feedback and comments.
IPAs: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/forums/homebrew-ale-recipes.62/?prefix_id=56
APAs: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/forums/homebrew-ale-recipes.62/?prefix_id=70
thehaze
Well-Known Member
I would start with a simple, yet delicious recipe. Maybe something like this:
Malt: 100% Maris Otter ( tasty on its own - Crisp, Simpsons, Bairds, Thomas Fawcett will do )
Yeast: Nottingham or US-05
Hops: It depends on your taste. If you want US hops, mix some Amarillo with Chinook and / or Comet ( Amarillo is more expensive, whereas Chinook and Comet are cheaper, but still very good hops ). If you want something different and even cheaper, go for a mix of Mandarina Bavaria, Huell Melon and Hallertau Blanc. These are somewhat, new school German hops. Start with 200 gr / 7 oz hops. You can either go for a non-dry hopped recipe or one you dry hop.
Mash temperature: 65C/149F
Mash time: 60 minutes
Boil time: 60 minutes
Make sure you know what's in your water and treat it. The Bru'nWater water spreadsheet is a great help when messing with water profiles, etc.
Ferment anywhere between 17 and 20C and after 3 days of active fermentation, raise the temperature to around 21-22-23, to help the yeast finish the job and clean after itself. This sort of beer can be ready in 12 to 17 days, depending on your packaging/serving options.
Malt: 100% Maris Otter ( tasty on its own - Crisp, Simpsons, Bairds, Thomas Fawcett will do )
Yeast: Nottingham or US-05
Hops: It depends on your taste. If you want US hops, mix some Amarillo with Chinook and / or Comet ( Amarillo is more expensive, whereas Chinook and Comet are cheaper, but still very good hops ). If you want something different and even cheaper, go for a mix of Mandarina Bavaria, Huell Melon and Hallertau Blanc. These are somewhat, new school German hops. Start with 200 gr / 7 oz hops. You can either go for a non-dry hopped recipe or one you dry hop.
Mash temperature: 65C/149F
Mash time: 60 minutes
Boil time: 60 minutes
Make sure you know what's in your water and treat it. The Bru'nWater water spreadsheet is a great help when messing with water profiles, etc.
Ferment anywhere between 17 and 20C and after 3 days of active fermentation, raise the temperature to around 21-22-23, to help the yeast finish the job and clean after itself. This sort of beer can be ready in 12 to 17 days, depending on your packaging/serving options.
Telling us where you live might be the first step. Some places in this world have easy access to all kinds of kits that make starting easy. Some places have restrictions on alcohol. Some places are pretty remote and access to kits means shipping them in.
VirginiaHops1
Well-Known Member
The recipe section here is a great resource, although simplicity varies by recipe. You didn't mention if you're looking to do extract or all-grain. The recipe section has far more grain recipes but you can find extract too.
If you want as simple as possible I would just buy a kit, either grain or extract whichever is your preference. If you don't have a LHBS near you buy it online. The ingredients all come pre-measured with instructions, although the instructions aren't always the best so you can still learn a lot here. The first brew may still be intimidating(it was for me) but your confidence level will grow drastically with each one.
If you want as simple as possible I would just buy a kit, either grain or extract whichever is your preference. If you don't have a LHBS near you buy it online. The ingredients all come pre-measured with instructions, although the instructions aren't always the best so you can still learn a lot here. The first brew may still be intimidating(it was for me) but your confidence level will grow drastically with each one.
I'm currently living in Prague, Czech Republic. We have no shops here so I'm limited to buying online via eu websites.
Velnerj
Simul justus et potator
Hey, I live in Czech Republic too. I've been homebrewing for almost two years now. Here's a list of sites in CZ to get ingredients and equipment. You're right, there are no physical shops in Prague though....
https://eshop.sladovna-kounice.cz
https://www.pivoteka.cz
https://www.vyrobtesipivo.cz
http://chmely.cz
http://hopproducts.cz/eshop/?fref=gc&dti=87801789392
https://www.homebrewshop.cz
https://pivoteka.beergeek.cz/homebrewing/
It sounds to me that you're set up to start with extract. Although apparently it's easier go that route at the beginning I wouldn't necessarily recommend it. There are two reasons:
1) Most really good tutorials online are all grain tutorials. The one I really liked was
Beer And BBQ by Larry you can find it on YouTube.
2) The price and quality of grains in this country are amazing and the extract kits and syrups are not really worth your time and money. The Kounice Sladovna (first link) arguably has some of the best grain around and it's dirt cheap. We're talking around 30 Kč per kilogram. For those keeping score back in the states that's about a $1.25 for almost 2.5 pounds of malt.
I'm not sure if you're a native or foreigner but if you can't read/czech you can use Google Translate on those pages and it'll lead you in the right direction.
Na Zdraví!
Thank you. This saves all of us a bit of time giving you advice to buy kits that are only available in the US and it looks like you have already gotten some good ideas for where to get the ingredients and instructions. Don't be afraid to ask other questions.
Gnomebrewer
Well-Known Member
This should be fairly straight forwards and suit your tastes. You'll need a thermometer, a grain bag to steep grain in (explained below) or a strainer of some sort, and some way to chill your boiling wort - I'm going to assume you'll use a water bath (also explained below).
Ingredients:
3Kg light dry malt (also called dry malt extract) split into two equal portions.
200g Caramel/Crystal malt. Light to medium colour. Between 20L and 60L, or 40EBC to 120EBC (L and EBC are different colour units, I'm not sure what's used in Czech Rep). This needs to be crushed (you should be able to order it crushed. If you can't, put it through a blender or food processor until all the grains are chopped at least in half).
200g Dextrose (corn sugar).
100g Centennial Hops, split in to two equal portions.
50g Citra Hops
1 packet of yeast - Fermentis Safale US05.
Process:
I'm going to assume you're making a 21L batch (25 to 30L fermenting buckets).
1. Before brew day: Soak the crushed Caramel/Crystal malt in two cups of hot water. Water is ideally about 70 to 80 degrees celsius. Don't use boiling water. Soak for at least 30 minutes (this is called steeping). You want the liquid off the grain to go in to your beer. Pour the grain and liquid through the strainer or grain bag, with a container below to collect the liquid. Put the grain into another 2 cups of water, stir, and again put through the strainer/bag to collect the liquid. Throw the grains away, keep the liquid. The liquid can be stored for up to a day in the fridge, but no longer than that.
2. Dissolve half (1.5Kg) of your dry malt extract in 10L of water in your pot. Add the liquid from the crystal malt. Bring to a boil. Watch out for boilover - the start of the boil can cause excessive foaming before the 'hot break' where the foam drops back in to the boiling liquid (called 'wort'). Reducing heat a little bit, blowing on the foaming surface or spraying with a mist of water all help to reduce foaming and boilovers.
3. Start a timer for 30 minutes.
4. After 10 minutes (20 minutes remaining on the timer) add 50g of Centennial hops. Just throw them straight in to the boiling wort.
5. After 25 minutes (5 minutes remaining on the timer) add the dextrose and remaining 1.5kg of dry malt extract.
6. When the timer is finished, turn off the heat (stop boiling), put the lid on, and begin chilling. Assuming this is in a water bath, you'll need something at least 5 times bigger than your boil pot to hold cold water. A big sink, plastic tub, or large laundry sink could all work. Sit your pot of near-boiling wort into the cold water to begin cooling. Once the cooling has started, add the remaining 50g of Centennial hops to the wort. Stir the wort occassionally (using a sanitised spoon or similar) and the water being used for cooling (with a different spoon - you don't want to contaminate the wort stirring spoon). If the cooling water is becoming too warm, replace it with cold water. You may need to use ice as well (it depends on the temperature of your cold water).
7. When your wort is at or below 25 degrees celsius (use a sanitise thermometer) pour it into a sanitised fermenter (it's ok for all to gunk, called 'trub' to go in). Add cold water to get to 21L. Cold tap water is normally OK if it's monitored and treated. If it's not, you'll need to boil water beforehand and cool it to room temperature.
8. Sprinkle your packet of yeast over the surface of the wort. Put the lid and airlock on and leave at around 18 to 21 degrees celsius for four days.
9. After four days, carefully (we don't want to let too much air in) remove the lid and drop in the citra hops. Put the lid back on and don't take it off again.
10. Leave for another 10 days. Take a gravity reading. Leave for another 2 days. Take another gravity reading. If both readings are the same, you're ready to bottle.
Ingredients:
3Kg light dry malt (also called dry malt extract) split into two equal portions.
200g Caramel/Crystal malt. Light to medium colour. Between 20L and 60L, or 40EBC to 120EBC (L and EBC are different colour units, I'm not sure what's used in Czech Rep). This needs to be crushed (you should be able to order it crushed. If you can't, put it through a blender or food processor until all the grains are chopped at least in half).
200g Dextrose (corn sugar).
100g Centennial Hops, split in to two equal portions.
50g Citra Hops
1 packet of yeast - Fermentis Safale US05.
Process:
I'm going to assume you're making a 21L batch (25 to 30L fermenting buckets).
1. Before brew day: Soak the crushed Caramel/Crystal malt in two cups of hot water. Water is ideally about 70 to 80 degrees celsius. Don't use boiling water. Soak for at least 30 minutes (this is called steeping). You want the liquid off the grain to go in to your beer. Pour the grain and liquid through the strainer or grain bag, with a container below to collect the liquid. Put the grain into another 2 cups of water, stir, and again put through the strainer/bag to collect the liquid. Throw the grains away, keep the liquid. The liquid can be stored for up to a day in the fridge, but no longer than that.
2. Dissolve half (1.5Kg) of your dry malt extract in 10L of water in your pot. Add the liquid from the crystal malt. Bring to a boil. Watch out for boilover - the start of the boil can cause excessive foaming before the 'hot break' where the foam drops back in to the boiling liquid (called 'wort'). Reducing heat a little bit, blowing on the foaming surface or spraying with a mist of water all help to reduce foaming and boilovers.
3. Start a timer for 30 minutes.
4. After 10 minutes (20 minutes remaining on the timer) add 50g of Centennial hops. Just throw them straight in to the boiling wort.
5. After 25 minutes (5 minutes remaining on the timer) add the dextrose and remaining 1.5kg of dry malt extract.
6. When the timer is finished, turn off the heat (stop boiling), put the lid on, and begin chilling. Assuming this is in a water bath, you'll need something at least 5 times bigger than your boil pot to hold cold water. A big sink, plastic tub, or large laundry sink could all work. Sit your pot of near-boiling wort into the cold water to begin cooling. Once the cooling has started, add the remaining 50g of Centennial hops to the wort. Stir the wort occassionally (using a sanitised spoon or similar) and the water being used for cooling (with a different spoon - you don't want to contaminate the wort stirring spoon). If the cooling water is becoming too warm, replace it with cold water. You may need to use ice as well (it depends on the temperature of your cold water).
7. When your wort is at or below 25 degrees celsius (use a sanitise thermometer) pour it into a sanitised fermenter (it's ok for all to gunk, called 'trub' to go in). Add cold water to get to 21L. Cold tap water is normally OK if it's monitored and treated. If it's not, you'll need to boil water beforehand and cool it to room temperature.
8. Sprinkle your packet of yeast over the surface of the wort. Put the lid and airlock on and leave at around 18 to 21 degrees celsius for four days.
9. After four days, carefully (we don't want to let too much air in) remove the lid and drop in the citra hops. Put the lid back on and don't take it off again.
10. Leave for another 10 days. Take a gravity reading. Leave for another 2 days. Take another gravity reading. If both readings are the same, you're ready to bottle.
Awesome! I'm an expat living here so will definitely be checking out those websites! Do you by any chance know of a website to buy 330ml bottles or is it just best to buy some beer and keep the bottles? What type of beers are you brewing?
